back to article Sweden may block Pirate Bay over child porn

Swedish police say they may put the world's largest torrent tracker, The Pirate Bay, on its porn filter blacklist after complaints about child porn being traded on the site. If Pirate Bay is placed on the list, anyone trying to access the site from Sweden through ISP's such as Telia, Tele2 and Bredbandsbolaget will be …

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  1. Klaus

    Three guesses as to who reported the "child porn"?

    Hmmm, I wonder if it could have been the record companies that found such nefarious, evil, website blacklisting files??

    Wouldn't it be a lark if somebody found that it was them actually uploading said content in an attempt to have the Bay shut down?

  2. Jags

    Would be awsome!

    Child porn or not, it would be great to see #1 facilitator of online piracy shut down. 'coz its damn easy to help distribute other's contents.

    If piratebay really wanna be #1 entertainment provider in the world, they should produce their own movies, music, software etc at the expense of billions/trillions of euros & then distribute it for FREE... or even better they can give away a real, brand spanking new ferrari with each free download at their own expense if they wanna be real generous.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    porn collection

    I have long suspected that something along these lines would come out, the Swedish government (under enormous pressure from the Americans) are desperate to close the pirate bay down, but, under their law they cannot. Therefore it is only natural to see this kind of tactics – it is quite easy to upload “porn collection” archive and bury some “child porn” – e.g. a picture of a 15 year old, that no one in a million years would identify as such. Then, after loads of people would download the archive, make a PR storm identifying the pirate bay as the peddler of paedophilia smut, and close it down forthwith.

    The playing field is not even, whilst the pirate bay does nothing illegal, the government is the government, and if faced with pressure, it will come up with a way to close it down. It is inevitable.

    Obviously no one is going to tell the pirate bay that they should remove the reference to file x, that is not the point. The point is closure, simple as that.

  4. This post has been deleted by its author

  5. heystoopid

    Oh me oh my

    Oh me oh my , from what I have seen of that site , the most annoying thing is the pop up personal adds on the side , something that is not a problem with FF plus extensions.

    Other than that minor irritation , these boys at "tpb" appear to run a tight ship indeed in comparison to some of the other sites , and seem to relish weeding out the industry entrapment honey pots and other very suspect torrents!

    But sadly , these wankers in the Sweden seeking such a listing would hardly put a dent in the daily average data streaming traversing the Swedish Internet of which 40% appears to be in the form of Bit Torrent packets.

    Such a blacklisting , is so easily defeated with relatively simple techniques , that it is a pointless exercise in futility ! , and sounds like a plot line from the comedy satire movie of you either get it or hate it soon to be a classic recently released direct to DVD called "Idiocracy".

    The "Peter Principle" rocks on in this new 21st century , that is for sure !

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Blocked - not shut down

    It's not about shutting down the bay. It's about adding the domain name to a filter list kept by the Swedish ISPs.

    A measure that's cunningly circumvented by adding the bay to your hosts file. Or using another DNS server, like OpenDNS.

  7. Pascal Monett Silver badge

    The police should request that files be taken down ?

    Of course not ! That would defeat the purpose of shutting them off, which is what this whole story is about. The laws of Sweden are what they are, but the politicians are always bought by greenbacks - and MPAA and co have lots and lots of greenbacks to throw at politicians.

    More, it seems, than they have to redistribute to honest artists, which, incidentally, is supposed to be their actual purpose.

  8. Sean O'Connor

    Shut Pirate Bay down asap

    > More, it seems, than they have to redistribute to honest artists, which, incidentally, is supposed to be their actual purpose.

    I don't want the MPAA to reimburse me for any of my work that appears on Pirate Bay, I just want them to shut them down. And I'm an honest artist. Thanks for your concern though.

    And if Pirate Bay can remove any links to child porn, why can't they remove links to our copyright material?

  9. N1AK

    Links

    Because Sean in Sweden links to copyrighted material are not illegal, whereas the blacklist specifically covers child porn links.

    I am not argueing that what they do is right or wrong, just that it is clearly an abuse to use a child porn filter to control piracy...

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re: Sean

    Sean,

    Copyright is outdated. It's now so easy to distribute information there is no real way of keeping track of it, shutting down one torrent site will only spawn others. Artists and record companies need to get themselves in order and either offer a product at a fair price, or else think of an alternative revenue stream. A quid for three minutes of noise that involves no effort on your part is not something I, or apparently millions of others, will pay.

    If I sold a product that was trivially easy to steal, then I'd be a fool to bemoan people taking it. Either give your customers what they want rather than treating them like criminals, or get another job.

  11. Turbojerry

    Next weeks headline...

    Swedish Police DDOS themselves with torrent of Pirate Bay traffic

  12. Andy Fletcher

    Copyright circumvention is EASY to fix

    If you don't want someone copying your work, simply don't allow the public to have access to it. Simple.

    This would be particularly welcome for any material produced by Craig David. Come on RIAA & MPAA - do the right thing and keep your works private. It's 95-98% rubbish and you know it.

  13. peter

    Google

    Don't they probably cache child porn and link to it and sell advertising by mistake next to it.

  14. Mectron

    How much bribe it take?

    how much the digital mafia (MPAA/RIAA) is paying to have the police of a country doing that? Sweden credibility just take a huge plunge!

  15. Will Leamon

    Fair Product Fair Price BS

    While I agree that the big six are grossly over charging I think this 'Fair Product Fair Price' argument is nonsense because to most people Fair Product = The best damn work I can do and Fair Price = Free.

    Furthermore millions of artists are bypassing the labels / distributors these days and setting up their own websites to sell directly to you dear consumer. But no one bothers to seek them out. I find this whole debate is revolving around the statement 'I won't buy from the major labels' with the quiet admission that 'I won't listen / watch anything that isn't from a major label'.

    I'm a big supporter of the bay / p2p / usenet as I believe poor people with a little smarts shouldn't be denied the media. And one probably shouldn't have to pay for idle curiosity. After all I want people to see my work. But when I see kids with $600 cell phones rocking stolen mp3s I can't admit it makes me happy.

  16. Steve Roper

    @Sean

    Set up a website and use bittorrent to distribute your music for free. You'll find that so-called "pirate" torrent sites will often be happy to promote your site and music too - it gives them legitimacy to promote indy artists. If you're that good as an artist, you'll build up a fanbase. If not, then you know you have to find another calling. Sorry mate, but that's just the way it works these days. The audience decide what they like, not marketroids and copyright cartels.

    If you do get a fanbase from your torrents, let your new torrent fans know via text/nfo files in your torrents, that you'll be performing live, then hire a hall or get billing with a club and start doing live gigs.

    That's what my muso mate does, and he makes plenty at it. Most of his band's fans come from the torrent scene. Get with the program, son - don't support the copyright pigs, use the system to your advantage. New technology = new business models. If the big guns can't make DRM work and are losing profits on CD sales, what chance do you think you've got by following them?

  17. Linus Östberg

    Pirate Bay will not be shut down

    "Polisen" today announced that pirate bay will not be shut down, as the torrents accused of containing child pornographic materials have been removed.

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Kiddie porn convictions

    I know someone who was convicted of possession of kiddie porn. On the basis of three pictures in a collection of several thousand. Which evidence showed he had never actually viewed. He got 24 months. All it takes is one picture, which someone like the MPAA or the RIAA (or MediaSentry) could upload.

  19. Spadge Fromley

    Lies, damn lies, and other lies.

    I've reported kiddie pr0n torrents to piratebay admins before, and got frankly nowhere.

    The admins know it gets posted, and don't much care if you report it.

    Now, someone explain to me wtf this has to do with piracy? Last I heard, owners of child pornography IP don't tend to advertise the fact.

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